Roach: Doctors need to do better job with patient care

Dear Dr. Roach: I am a healthy 70-year-old female. In the past year or so, though, I have had no energy. I feel like my head is in a fog all the time. I have been to doctors with these complaints, and they ask a few questions or maybe give me a blood test, but I never get a reason or help with the way I feel. It is an effort to lift my feet or arms sometimes. Is this what 70 feels like and I just need to accept it? I feel like this is what doctors think of me now. -- R.T.

Dr. Roach: There are potentially many medical causes for your concerns. However, lack of energy, muscle weakness and the feeling of being in a fog are very nonspecific. I can think of a dozen causes off the top of my head, starting with thyroid problems, vitamin D deficiency and polymyalgia rheumatica (although that usually is arms and shoulders, and is much worse in the mornings).

You haven't been getting the kind of care you need. Make it clear to your doctor that this is a real change from how you were before this started, and keep going back. Yes, we all slow down a bit as we get older, but I have seen too many people not get care for medical conditions soon enough because they convinced themselves, or their doctor convinced them, that it was just due to getting old.

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Roach: Doctors need to do better job with patient care

Dear Dr. Roach: I am a healthy 70-year-old female. In the past year or so, though, I have had no energy. I feel like my head is in a fog all the time. I have been to doctors with these complaints,